For this episode, we picked stories and poems that intimately professed our individual relationships with grief and loss. Storytelling has always been an intrinsic part of processing grief. It allows us to recollect the memories of a loved one, to learn about the parts of ourselves that maybe we hadn’t given much attention to. It allows us to build…

This episode tells stories of injury, embarrassments and debacles all with a comedic twist. Why are injuries and mistakes so funny? Maybe we'll never know for sure, but in the meantime, we'll keep laughing. We hear from Julie Truskowski, Monte Montepare and Jon Erdman. Special thanks to Cole Pampe for contributing his original music. Visit our webs…

Throughout this episode we take a look at the ways in which we experience being in relationships- with ourselves and with others. These stories and poems speak to the good, the bad, the ugly, and the in between of what it’s like to be in love, to be a friend, to be a first date and to be broken-hearted. We hear from Owen Mozen, Laura (a visitor fro…

We have an amazing line-up of well-known McCarthy residents including Barb Rice, Mark Vail, Mike Murphy, Michelle Latvala and Wendy Pollock featured in our second episode, McCarthy Made. This episode speaks to the many ways in which McCarthy residents experience their home, from their discovery of this eccentric place, what it means to be a neighbo…

This episode features hand-picked stories and poems told by McCarthy locals and visitors throughout our 2023 summer programming including our Wrangell Mountain Storytelling Festival and our bi-weekly Word Jam events. These poems and stories speak to the profoundly integral relationship we humans each have with mother nature. We hear from Katy about…

Episode 5 is our last episode of the season in this storytelling series and features two stories told at the West Side venue. Madz shares a poignant, vulnerable story about a friend, and Nik Merlino, our host and sponsor for the West Side event - the owner of McCarthy River Tours & Outfitters and The Glacier View Campground - tells a story about a …

This season's podcast series features handpicked stories from the 2022 Storytelling Festival in Kennicott-McCarthy. Episode 4 features two stories from the west side during the twilight time of night as the light was starting to dim on that glorious evening in August at the Glacier View Campground. Folks began stepping up to the mic and sharing sto…

Everyone loves a good Alaska bear story, and local McCarthy resident Dianne Milliard delivers a series of short stories that speak to the theme of Carnivore Karma. And also in this episode, Madz opened the storytelling festival at the Old Hardware Store with a story about her father and the San Fransisco Zoo, setting the tone for the entire 3-day e…

This podcast series features handpicked stories from the 2022 Storytelling Festival in Kennicott-McCarthy - three days of grassroots stories, from local and visiting storytellers. This series explores some of the magic of that in-person event, from the Old Hardware Story in historic downtown McCarthy, and the Glacier View Campground on McCarthy’s w…

Season 3 of our End of the Road Podcast Series features handpicked stories from the 2022 Storytelling Festival in Kennicott-McCarthy. The Wrangell Mountains Center hosted 3 days of grassroots storytelling that summer, featuring local and visiting storytellers. In this episode, storytelling contest winner Bill Mann brought the house down and had us …

In this episode, we talk with Jenny Rosenbaum about how she found McCarthy, why she made a home here, and we also asked her to give us the scoop on the cannabis shop that she is opening in McCarthy next summer. Visit our website at wrangells.org, or stay connected to us through facebook.com/wrangells or Instagram @wrangellmountainscenter.…

In this episode, we talk with local climate and social activist, Cassidy Austin-Merlino about climate and social justice issues, working to stop the Pebble Mine, how to make the outdoors more inclusive, and the steps our remote community can take toward solutions. Visit our website at wrangells.org, or stay connected to us through facebook.com/wran…

Dr. Margot Higgins, Associate Teaching Professor at the University of Wisconsin, LaCrosse shares thoughts and ideas from her research and writings challenging our conventional story about the presence or absence of the Ahtna-Athabascan people in the Kennicott River Valley. She explains why radical empathy may be the way forward to relating with thi…

Steve Edwards tells the story of his mom’s pride and joy 49 Chevy, and the epic journey it took getting it to McCarthy in 1963. His father, Jim Edwards, was renown for his feats of daring, but the story of Jim getting this car to McCarthy when there was only a railroad bed, is truly one for the history books! Visit our website at wrangells.org, or …

Professional storyteller Jack Dalton talks about The Other Side of Storytelling with WMC’s Executive Director, Jon Erdman. This is Part Two of a lively discussion on the inner experience of being a storyteller, the power stories have to deliver tough messages in difficult places, and the wider definition of storytelling. Visit our website at wrange…

In this episode, professional storyteller, Jack Dalton, talks with WMC’s Executive Director, Jon Erdman, about the art of storytelling and the power of story. Jack has traveled the world telling stories and competing in storytelling events. In this interview, he discusses what makes a good story, how stories come to him sometimes right as he’s walk…

In this episode, Tom Kizzia takes us into the 1983 shootings in McCarthy that killed six of the town’s 22 residents. He focuses on Amy Ashenden, a lesser known victim of the shootings. We continue our conversation with author, Tom Kizzia, discussing his new book titled, Cold Mountain Path: The Ghost Town Decades of McCarthy-Kennecott, Alaska. In hi…

In our first episode of Season Two we explore the Ghost Town decades of our Kennecott-McCarthy community in remote Alaska by way of an interview with author Tom Kizzia and his new book, Cold Mountain Path: The Ghost Town Decades of McCarthy-Kennecott, Alaska. We discuss ghost towns and what that means as a metaphor, not just about the past but abou…

When Papa Pilgrim came to town, back in the early 2000s, tensions flared, bringing to a head decades of conflict between the National Parks Service and the community of private land holders in the Wrangell Mountains. With SWAT teams descending on the tiny town of McCarthy, the Pilgrim fiasco grabbed national headlines and ignited a nation-wide poli…

In the face of great personal loss, Irish photographer Paul Scannell leaves London behind and eventually finds his way to the Wrangells in remote bush Alaska. Skipping his flight home, Paul is drawn to the crumbling, abandoned places in the Wrangells and the stories that these remains suggest. We discuss Paul’s journey. We talk iPhones and photogra…

Shaped by the wilderness and the lawless town of McCarthy Alaska in the 1970s, Sally Gibert lived the frontier life in Alaska then went on to found a significant and impactful nonprofit and eventually helped shape the map of the state of Alaska. This is part one of two parts, exploring Sally's early adult life in the frontier town of McCarthy as sh…

Ben reflects on the ongoing natural cycles of catastrophe, regrowth and regeneration that he discovers as he walks through two stories from the Wrangells: an epic story of dinosaurs and deep time, and a story about the last hundred years in the McCarthy community. Ben's insights and contemplative cadence provide a much-appreciated perspective, a pe…